New York Times Whitewashes Cochran's Racial Tactics

I’m not particularly aggrieved by Thad Cochran’s victory in the Senate runoff in Mississippi over challenger Chris McDaniel. Cochran’s tactics–ginning up fear among black Democrats by exploiting false accusations of racism against the Tea Party–may be nasty, and they certainly end whatever claim Cochran had to being a conservative or even a decent public servant. But they are not illegal, and once he decided to fight, he fought to win. There’s a lesson in that for conservatives.

It was an extraordinary end to a wild campaign, with a Republican standing up for the rights of black Democrats, and with Tea Party groups from the North, especially the Senate Conservatives Fund, crying foul.

Oh, please: “standing up for the rights of black Democrats”? No one’s rights were at stake. Cochran played the race card, dividing the electorate for the sake of his own decrepit incumbency.

It’s a page straight out of Barack Obama’s playbook, which is why the Times likes it. But it’s just playing the race card. Nothing to be proud of, except in the perverse, mercenary, Frank Underwood sense. It will do more harm than good, and already has.